The Energy Coalition is seeking a communications and marketing agency. The Energy Coalition is seeking to engage an innovative and creative Communications & Marketing firm to design and implement a robust web portal. This portal will be the go-to energy efficiency resource for public agencies, a resource that agencies will seek out for information and use as a platform to share information and participate in peer-to-peer learning.
The Energy Coalition (TEC) is a California-based 501(c)3 nonprofit with over forty-five years’ experience in partnering with communities, public agencies, private companies, educators and policymakers to design and implement sustainability strategies. As a social change organization, TEC’s mission is to create an abundant and healthy world by inspiring others to take responsible environmental actions. Working through our three core service areas – energy policy leadership, engagement and education, and energy services – we collectively achieve valuable environmental savings that benefit everyone.
Project Background Information
Redesign and launch a new website for The Energy Network program which includes a robust, password-protected ORL, providing public agencies with capacity and expertise-building energy efficiency tools and templates. The Energy Network was authorized by the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) in 2012 to harness the collective power of residents, businesses, and the public sector to achieve an unprecedented level of energy savings across Southern California. This program is administered by the County of Los Angeles and funded by California utility ratepayers under the auspices of the CPUC.
TEC designed and is currently implementing The Energy Network’s Public Agency Program which, at no-cost to agencies, identifies energy saving measures and works side-by-side with agency staff to complete energy efficiency projects. Services include project support from start-to-finish, technical assistance, access to financing, competitively bid specialty contractors, transparent pricing, assistance with utility rebate processing, and more. One of the program’s goals is to improve participating public agency and local government staff awareness and expertise in energy efficiency. The program seeks to enroll all eligible agencies via registering on the website in order to reach all eligible agencies within the twelve County service territory — more than 700 public agencies throughout Southern California.
Scope of Work
The scope of work for this RFP is to revise the public agency section of the current Energy Network website. The revision will include strategic design of a robust, interactive web portal while condensing current pages and information into a more user-friendly interface. Design of an accessible, easy to navigate ORL is a key deliverable. Tools and templates for the ORL may include: program documents, fact sheets and flyers; videos; news articles; guidebooks; resource connections; online trainings and more. Content will continue to be added to the ORL as the program moves forward so the design will need to be flexible enough to allow for additional future content while still being user-friendly and easy to navigate. In addition to tools and templates, the ORL should also have some sort of ‘village green’ or ‘network’ platform where enrolled agencies can communicate with their peers by asking questions, posting relevant information and sharing best practices and lessons learned. Finally, the website’s new landing page and/or homepage needs to include a program dashboard which will act as a program ‘executive summary’ or ‘snapshot’ — highlighting all program goals, success metrics and current stats.
To summarize, the SOW is as follows:
- Develop a strategic plan to create the ‘go-to energy efficiency resource’ for public agencies via a web portal which includes a redesign of the program’s current site;
- Develop outreach strategies to drive public agencies to the website and incentives to register/join ‘the network’;
- Redesign the The Energy Network Public Agency website including but not limited to:
- Condense current pages into a more user-friendly, modern and easy to navigate design;
- Add a program dashboard to the landing page and/or home page to showcase a program ‘executive summary’ — highlighting program goals, success metrics and current stats;
- Add a robust password protected ORL (online resource library) w/ search function, collecting the following information upon registration: name, title, department, agency, email, and phone;
- ORL will include program docs, tools, templates, videos, news articles, guidebooks, resource connections, online trainings, etc.;
- Within ORL, add a social/chat feature for agencies to communicate with each other and share best practices, lessons learned, etc.;
- Within ORL, add a feature for ‘suggest your topic or ask your question’; and,
- Within ORL, track all activity (number of logins, views, etc.) and downloads of tools, templates and resources by user and date (name, agency, etc.).
Proposal due by Friday, March 3 to:
47 Discovery, Suite 250
Irvine, CA 92618
Tel: 949-701-4646
Fax: 949-701-4644
www.energycoalition.org
Leading PR firms in California include Porter Novelli and APCO Worldwide.